


Voltron: Next Generation

by Beigehere



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, voltron next generation - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-30
Updated: 2018-07-05
Packaged: 2019-03-16 21:12:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 17,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13644537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beigehere/pseuds/Beigehere
Summary: Our beloved Voltron gang is all grown, old, and prosperous. But what happens when darkness swirls within the depths once more, and the lions shut themselves off from their paladins?The answer is simple, we need a new team Voltron(this is definitely an ocxoc but now all your fav ships are cannon)





	1. Prolouge

The alarms haven't gone off in exactly 12 years and 4 months, Lance had been counting. So one could imagine his shock when Keith shook him awake and yelled to him "Lance hurry, we have to go, something's happened!"

"Keith, what is it?" Lance yelled back around the noise, putting on his clean clothes in a rush after Keith's example.

"I don't know, but the alarm, whatever it is it can't be good." Keith grabbed his husband's hand and they ran down the hall towards the bridge.

Shiro and Hunk were typing away wildly on their screens, and Coran and Kairos working quickly on the directory screens. Lance and Keith jumped into their own seats and began pulling up information.

Allura stood on her pedestal directing maps and yelling "Shiro, I feel the energy getting stronger and darker!"

"Coran, anything on the source? Or what threw the alarm?" Pidge asked typing furiously onto her holoscreen.

"Whatever this is it can't be good." Hunk said reading something over Pidge's shoulder. "These refractory readings are off the chart!"

"Yeah, I think it's some sort of Quintessence, but I don't know, I haven't ever seen it like this, it's acting as if it's, being controlled. When we saw Quintessence with Zarkon, it had controlled him..." Pidge rambled.

"I don't think I follow," said Lance.

"What she's trying to say is that there is something out there, something big enough and powerful enough to be spitting out raw Quintessence, dark Quintessence," Allura said, moving screens around furiously.

"Do we have a location from where it's being projected?"

"Roger that, it seems to be coming from... no, I don't believe it," Coran muttered.

"Coran, what is it?" Keith asked.

"It's coming from far away, far far away, farther than the technical known universe, farther than we have ever, ever even thought about traveling. I'm talking distance." Coran explained, furrowing his eyebrows together in nervousness.

"How much energy would it take to wormhole there?" Allura asked.

"Honestly my queen, more than you have, by a significant margin. The distance is absolutely massive, at least 300x what we've traveled before."

Kairos turned and looked at his mother expectantly, hoping to be given the task of assisting the wormhole with her, instead, Kairos heard his father say "I think for right now we should just keep an eye on it, just until we can figure out something long term, because right now as far as we know it's not hurting anything, just being threatening."

"I agree with Shiro I would much rather stay here than go close to the unfathomable power of darkness thingy." Hunk said

Eventually, all of the paladins agreed, and Shiro made the next statement. "I know we haven't been out and about in our lions recently, and with this looming over us, I say we take to a few training sessions and practice up in them just to be sure we're prepared."

And that was how the 5 paladins of Voltron found that their lions, no longer responded to them.


	2. Leaving Earth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is honest trash I'm sorry

I can't believe how cold this water is honestly, you'd think we lived anywhere but Florida.

I quickly dried my icy hands off and looked at all the jackets I had laid out on my bed.

Most of them yellow actually. The same yellow as the posters on my walls featuring my favorite lion of Voltron, and probably the best paladin out of all of them.

When I heard that the king and Queen of the Castle of Lions were looking for the next generation of paladins, I couldn't control my excitement. They broadcasted a fair chance for anyone interested, and cruiser shuttles arriving at any planet in any city to pick up anyone (so long as they passed through security).

Unfortunately, hiding my excitement was probably the thing to do. Once my mother caught a whiff of it, she forbade it, in every sense. I was to stay on Earth, I was to do my job, my work, I was to make money, I was to be quiet and respectful at all times, I was to teach Levi school work, which as my mother so often pointed out, I had the privilege to get, and my younger brother did not because I didn't step up and get a job as soon as I was 14. Thus we didn't have money to send Levi to something like school.

I bit my tongue and reminded myself that this plan would work, that I would get out of here with Levi in tow on one of the cruiser shuttles, and maybe even pick up the yellow lion somewhere along the way.

I heard Levi quietly do our secret know on my door and I told him I'd be ready in just a minute. I examined my favorite yellow jacket, wondering if that would give me a leg up with connecting with the lion, already wearing its colors.

But deep down I knew I would be taking my father's red and gray hoodie. I wasn't sure if it really did still smell like him, but I sure as heck pretended to think it did. I slipped the jacket on and grabbed my backpack making sure the combination lock holding together the two zippers was in place before silently slinging it onto my back.

I exited into the hallway to see my baby brother there waiting for me to hurry the heck up and I followed him silently out of the house.

My adrenaline was going haywire as we made it to the Netro and I handed the tickets I bought a few days ago to the ticket lady with a shaky hand. She ushered us through as well as a few other people all set to go to Atlanta Georgia, the closest pickup spot on this side of the US.

I held my breath watching the door to the speed train as people trickled into it. It wasn't until the train took off that I relaxed. I put an arm around my brother and grinned, we made it away from our mother.

Now, all we had to do was get on that shuttle and get as far away from Earth as possible.

I leaned on my little brother (I saw little, he's 19 and 6"2') and he leaned on me and eventually we fell asleep.

"Hey Gen." I heard someone say as I was lightly shaken.

"Levi, hey what's up? Are we there?" I asked, looking around.

Levi had a huge dorky grin on his face and nodded. "10 minutes." He whispered.

Our compartment was much more crowded now than it had been last night when we boarded, we must have picked up a lot of people through the night.

I checked my watch to see it was 9:57, my mother has since been awake and probably been searching for us. Good thing I left any trackable tech at home, Levi as well. At this rate, we'll be gone before she can even get a Netro ticket.

When the speed train finally docked, Levi and I hurried off and joined the crowd of young adults and teenagers all moving their way to the surface where the shuttle was waiting.

Security was ushering people through fast, and one in every like 10 people were either pulled aside and patted down or denied entry due to suspicious technology in their possession.

I couldn't help share a smile with my brother as we were both let through and onto the gigantic shuttle.

Atlanta was the last stop for any travelers on Earth, and as we passed other passengers on the lower levels I marveled at the diversity and how many different languages were being spoken. Some of these people had to have been here since yesterday morning, when the ship made its first stop in Tokyo, Japan.

We were taken to level 17 to sit, and we entered the huge room. It reminded me strongly of an airport, where you sit and wait for your plane with rows upon rows of seats and one bordering the windows around the walls. Levi and I rushed to get two seats along the windows and sat down as we watched more people file into the ship.

Levi and I quietly discussed some plans for when we finally got off the planet when a young man, about my age, asked to sit next to me. I politely accepted and turned back to my brother to see his face gone white and his hand clenched my arm.

"Genesis." He whispered.

"What, Levi what's wrong?" I asked, my stomach dropping.

He turned his gaze to the window and I followed it to see... no.

My stomach dropped and my anxiety sky-rocketed.

"She can't be here, it's impossible, there's no way," I said.

I checked my watch, we were supposed to take off two minutes ago, they can't let her on.

"Okok, listen, if they let her on, we hide, ok? We get out of the open and we hide, but no matter what we stay aboard. Got it?" I told my brother, to which he nodded.

If my mom boards this craft, and she finds us? She will literally kill us. She's killed people before, and after disobedience like this? We will be dead.

"Woah, what's going on? Who are you hiding from?" The guy who sat next to me asked, with something like genuine concern on his face.

I glanced at him nervously, shoot, he wasn't supposed to hear. I glanced at my brother and he swallowed thickly before speaking. "Our mom. You see, my sister and I have been, well practically enslaved by her. We work for her, and all our wages go directly to her, and if we don't do what she says, she beats us. She has a band of thugs that she sells drugs to that do her dirty work, and well, she's killed, people. So if they let her on the ship, we'll die."

I cringed at Levi's last words. "Well, sh*t." The guy said glancing out the window with us.

The guy glanced around us before he said "If they let her on I can help get y'all to another level, and then maybe we can hide y'all in the men's restroom? I'm sure there's somewhere we could go I could help you hide."

I wasn't one to trust easily, and this guy didn't seem overly trustworthy, which is good because you should always be suspicious of people who seem overly trustworthy, and based on that I figured, we could count on him.

I extended my hand to him "Genesis, though you can call me Gen."

We shook hands and he then shook with my brother, "Leviticus, though you can call me Levi."

"Jake, though you can call me Jake." he said, and it caused a very small smile to appear on my face.

"Thank you for helping us, I know we don't exactly know each other or anything."

"It's fine, honestly. I know what it's like to grow up in a bad house." He smiled sadly and the lapse in the conversation drew all of our attention to the window... where my mother was being escorted onto the aircraft with the final bouts of staff members.

Levi and Jake grabbed my arms simultaneously and we stood quickly and grabbed our stuff before swiftly making it to the stairwell at the end of the room.

Bless the stars no one questioned us as we made our way to one of the lower levels, we actually went all the way to three when we 'casually' sat near the stairwell next to a group of people speaking animated Russian and Jake leaned into me "Would she recognize your clothes?" he asked.

Levi shook his head no "but she'll recognize my jacket, it belonged to my dad." I told him.

He nodded and stripped his jacket off his shoulders. I didn't question him as I pulled the slightly too big jacket over my own slightly too big jacket and hid my long unfortunately blonde hair under the hood. 

I murmured a thank you as I turned to watch the elevator, which was about to stop on level 17. I breathed a small sigh of relief and shared a look with my brother. 

"We should try to stay one step ahead of her." Levi said. 

Jake nodded and we were off, they ushered me to outside to door of the men's restroom and Jake went in ahead to see if there were people in there while I watched the stairwell and elevator with Levi's back to shield my face should she appear at one of them.

After a minute, and three middle-aged men left the restroom, I felt Jake nudge me and the three of us swept into the room. Under normal circumstances, I would have been extremely embarrassed, but the anxiety in my gut prevented that from happening. 

I went into a stall and sat on the tank with my feet on the lid of the thankfully clean toilet. Levi followed into the stall after me and stood with his back against the door. 

"I'll wait right here just in case." I heard Jake say from over by the sinks.

"Thanks." Levi whispered.

Several grueling minutes rolled by, we heard the captain speaking over the intercom, take off, with a flight time of 3 minutes. Then he droned on about rules of hyperspace and please be seated with your belt buckled to ensure safety, and then finally, finally, we felt the shuttle lift off.

The ascent and descent went smoothly, even from a bathroom, and as soon as we felt the shuttle land the three of us were out of the restroom in a flash. We instantly ran down to the first floor, which was being unloaded first, and casually shuffled our way out with the rest of the crowd. 

In the heat of 'oh crap,' I didn't fully take in the wonder of the planet we had just landed on. Oh geez, we were on a different planet. Skeron to be exact, 26,000 light years from Earth.

The planet was chosen for its flat planes and expanse of emptiness, perfect apparently, for choosing the next heroes of the universe.

The whole thing was simple, the 5 lions of Voltron stood in a line with their particle barriers around them, according to lore, if you were the chosen pilot, the barrier would disappear and the lion would come to life, claiming you. 

Looking up at the lions themselves, my heart dropped, only three lions still stood, the others had already claimed their paladins. Yellow and Blue were gone. Yellow had claimed its paladin. sh*t.

Honestly, what was I thinking that it could be me?

We merged into the progression of aliens from the planets Zecros and Balmera 47 as well as a few other humans and walked towards the lions. As magnificent as they were, their castle stood behind them, the middle spire reaching higher than three shuttles on top of each other.

Levi kept looking over his shoulder, probably to watch if our mother decided to appear.

Despite my amazement, My head was spinning, the yellow lion was my only chance, crap how do we get off this planet and on a ship headed somewhere else?

I spied the last of the Juvilites up ahead of us and saw their ship getting ready to take off. That's it! Juvikari is a friendly and safe planet, perfect for a few Earthen runaways. 

I told Levi and Jake my plan and they agreed. Jake wished us luck and I nodded at him, thanking him profusely for his help. As I gave him his jacket back, Levi and I carefully ran through the outside of the crowd. I knew it was a little more obvious to see us, but if we caught up with that big groud of Juvilites we could sneak onto the ship and we'd be free for good. 

We were almost to the lions and the group of now disappointed looking Juvilites when I heard an other-worldly but distant shriek, "Genesis! Leviticus!"

My mother.

Sh*t 

We ran faster and I intended to keep going when the crowd began yelling wildly, the Red lion had awakened. Thank god what a blessing of a distraction. The crowd thickened as the aliens behind us swarmed to the red lion.

Come on come on we were so close now, surely we lost her in the crowd.

Then I heard screaming and almost screamed myself as a giant something or other landed right in front of me.

Suddenly the voice in my head screaming 'RUN' had disappeared and I stood frozen looking up at the red lion.

I was brought back to reality when My brother was pulling on my sleeve and I turned to look at him and then what he was looking at, my mother, who had clawed her way through the crowd and was pushing aliens left and right, was only 20 feet away. I turned to the lion, whose head lay on the ground now, it's mouth open and welcoming to me. Without a second thought, I grabbed my brother's arm and ran inside.

Then I heard a door shut. 

Holy sh*t

"Holy sh*t" Levi said, getting up from his position hunched under me. I stood and brushed myself off after making sure he was ok. 

I was about to respond to him when I heard something tugging at my head, not a voice exactly, more like an idea.

Despite the countless calls of my name from Levi, I followed the something up out of the hangar and through the flow of the ship into a cockpit.

I took a deep breath and sat down. 

"Gen, are you..."

"Yes." I said, for once, absolutely once, knowing for sure.

Now if only I knew how to fly a ship. Regardless I carefully placed my hands on the controls in front of me and the lion, quite literally, roared to life under my hands.

"No way!" I yelled, feeling a power seep into me as I looked around the screen in front of me, my mother was there, down below at my feet, er, the lion's feet, and with a movement of my hand (that I didn't even register until I had already done it), Red took to the sky.

"Hold on!" I yelled to Levi, sensing the lion's next move.

"To what?!" He yelled, right before we zoomed into three consecutive loops and spins and gosh I'd never felt so alive. I could hear Levi screaming behind me, and soon my own amused one joined him as Red then flew into a hangar in the castle in the blink of an eye.

Red landed and knelt his head down for the two of us to exit.

Instead, I sat for a minute, unable to stop the tears flowing from my eyes.

"Oh my god my sister is the red paladin." Levi muttered, then rushed to me when he saw my state.

"Gen, come on." He said holding onto my shoulder as I got up from the pilot's chair.

I wiped my tears in an instant, as the momentary shock wore off.

Holy sh*t.


	3. The Black Paladin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I stole the chapter name from the show, please have mercy

I worked up the courage to finally exit the lion, er, my lion. I told Levi to stay close behind me and hoped they would excuse his presence based on the circumstances.

As I stepped off the ramp and looked at the line of people in front of me I couldn't help but notice they all wore smiles, directed right at me, for about .3 seconds until they saw my brother.

King freakin Shiro opened his mouth to say something when suddenly my brother was speaking, "She's the pilot, not me."

"Sorry he's my brother it got kind of, wild I guess and I took him aboard with me..." I trailed off, turning behind me to make much needed supportive eye contact with him.

When I turned back I let out an 'oof' as two grown men crushed me in a hug. 

Oh gosh, Lance and Keith McClain-Kogane were hugging me.

"Hi, I'm Lance, this is Keith, though I'm sure you already knew that, what's your name?"

Keep your cool Gen, get it together "Hi, my name's Genesis Mathews, but you can call me Gen." I said smiling confidently.

"Awesome, well welcome to the Castle of Lions and Team Voltron! We were-" but Lance was cut off by the woosh of the hangar doors and the roar of the Green lion landing. 

The group of absolute superheroes in front me drew quiet as we all watched in anticipation as a figure walked out of the green lion.

His eyes scanned the crowd and eventually landed on me.

"No way!" I said running up him

Jake grinned and swaggered over to me and before I knew it the lanky man had pulled me into a hug.

"I'm so glad you got out of there, you and Levi." He whispered to me before he was attacked in a hug by none other than Pidge Holt.

Jake introduced himself to the group and the adults ushered us through the mesmerizing castle and into a grand hall where Allura, fricken Queen Allura of Altea was talking with two aliens who I assumed were my new teammates. 

Levi tugged on my sleeve and timidly whispered: "What do I do?" 

My elation dropped. I glanced wildly around for Lance and Keith, who I figured were the most approachable and snagged Keith's eye.

I quietly went up and asked him "Um, what should my brother do?" 

He smiled gently at me and said: "Don't worry about it, he can hang with our space uncle Coran until Allura's given you your little welcome speech."

"Thank you so much, and I'll explain later, but uh, please, you can't send him back to Earth, there's kinda something I need to tell you first."

His confusion lasted for a moment before he nodded, "Don't worry Gen, we're here for you." I was about to thank him again when he ushered me to Queen Allura, "Go on, meet your team." I couldn't help but smile back at him as I made my way to the group, the rest of the adults headed towards the hangar, probably to await the Black lion.

I made a mental note to thank Jake for distracting everyone while I suffered from embarrassment in front of Keith and introduced myself to my new team.

Gosh, Team Voltron

The girl introduced herself first, her name was Kaeza. Her dark hair was in dreadlocks that if released from their up-do, would surely reach the top of her thighs. Her skin was a dark aqua-marine and she sported glowing tribal tattoos known to the Decarins. She had crystals pierced into the skin along her pointed reptilian ears and accentuated the pebble-y iridescence of her skin. Her eyes were a gentle kind of brown and her smile was easy going. She was the new pilot of the blue lion. She dressed like she knew it as well, with a pastel blue top on her lithe frame, and white pants that had a sliver of a sheer panel along the side seems that revealed more of her tattoos. 

The yellow paladin went next, and I couldn't help but agree with the lion's choice. He was a tall stocky Galran guy with a light lavender skin. His face was very gentle and his features were softer and more humanoid than most Galra I've seen. He had to have been a hybrid of something because his pale yellow eyes had irises. His name was Pytorizayn, but told us to call him Py. 

Jake introduced himself and as I listened to him speak I assessed his lanky frame. He was almost as tall as my brother and about as thin as Kaeza. He had dark brown hair that fell into his equally brown eyes and I noticed how as he talked he drummed his fingers on his leg.

Yeesh, that kid has ADHD.

I introduced myself next, trying not to be awkward as possible. 

Allura then introduced herself, which was kinda useless, because it's impossible to name anyone in the universe who doesn't know her. I heard all about how kind and fierce she was but dang sitting there listening to her talk, she was so, so, motherly, I guess, in a way my mother never was.

Over a dinner of strange alien delicacies prepared by Hunk, my old hero I guess, I learned that Kaeza had been chosen on the first day 4 days ago, and Py on the third day, and everyone had been a little overwhelmed that Jake and I got it on the same day, but they were all happy nonetheless. 

I finally got to talk to so many of my heroes and meet the people I'd been looking up to my whole life, I didn't even know the King and Queen had a son, especially one my age. I couldn't help but snicker when he introduced himself as Kairos. I asked if he knew if his name meant opportunity in greek, or 'right timing' in English, and he said his name came from Kai, which was his grandfather's name, and Ros meaning descendent in Altean. He asked me where my name came from, and I told him it was the name of the first book in an ancient Earthen religion my father had been a part of, I admitted that I didn't know much about it, just that it told the story of Earth's beginnings. Kairos said he liked it, my-my name I mean.

Whenever anyone asked questions directed at Levi and me, I made sure to answer them without diving into it too much, and to my surprise, Lance and Keith helped me on it as well by changing the subject in a convincing and smooth way.

Eventually, we got to the end of the dinner and I saw Lance and Keith whisper something to Shiro before leading me and Levi from the others who were being shown to their new bedrooms.

He brought me to a lounge looking room and motioned for me to sit next to him and Keith. "Ok, what's going on, and I know you probably feel uncomfortable, we don't know each other very well, but you need to explain this." He said.

I nodded and began the story. I told them of how my father was a rebel fighter, how he lead the Earthen resistance to the Galra when they first attacked the Earth. He had died in combat. I was 3, Levi was 1.

"The only memories I had of him where when he would cradle me in his arms and sing me to sleep, and what stands out in my memories the most is his smell, which used to be on this jacket, but I think it's faded after all these years," I said. "Anyway, growing up my mother seemed to always be mourning, she would lock herself up in her room for days and never come out, we had a nanny or babysitter to watch us when she got like that in the beginning, then when I was 11 I was left to take care of Levi myself. I was 13 when she lost her job and stopped looking for a new one. The only income we had was that I got checks from my dad's parents for school, Levi did too, but my mom took his from him and used it to fuel her drug addiction. When I became legally old enough to work I took on as many jobs as possible, and all my paychecks were wired to go directly to her bank account. There was nothing I could do, she's so manipulative that she can convince anyone of anything, including me. When I was 17 she started sleeping with a drug dealer, and planted her power seed in that industry, raking in money from the kind of desperate messed up people she was just like. We never got to enjoy any of that money. I tried to rebel and fight back when her boyfriend started beating Levi for being gay, but more men started showing up and beating the both of us, all at her command. I guess it's lucky the worst it got was beating and not... other kinds of abuse and assault. But, when I heard about the lions looking for new paladins, that was everything. Of course, our mother forbade it, but we sneaked out and onto the shuttle anyway. Somehow she managed to find us and they let her on the shuttle, but Jake actually, who was right there funny enough, helped us hide and get off without her finding us. We were going to stow away on another ship headed for a different planet when she caught up to us as we passed the lions, then Red came to me, and saved us." It was a long-winded explanation and I held onto Levi's shaking hand not daring to look at his face because I know he was crying.

Lance and Keith sat motionless for a moment before Keith spoke "I'm so sorry you had to live through this, you both deserve so much more than this pain. We will figure this out, in the meantime, I don't see why Levi can't stay in the castle with us, we have more than enough room."

Lance nodded "Do you mind if we share this with Shiro and the other, adults, we just want to make sure we can all protect you and help you the way you need it, and Shiro and Allura are pretty smart I know they can find a way to fix this.

"No, please go ahead, whatever will be best, my top priority is making sure my baby brother is safe." I could feel Levi roll his eyes, but he also squeezed my hand in a loving way.

"It's ok, you can trust us, besides, we're your family now." Lance said, "and family helps family."

I went to sleep that night wondering if I would wake up to my normal alarm, back in my room on Earth, or to the same shiny ceiling I had been looking at for 20 minutes. 

It was the later. As I stretched and got out of my bed I couldn't believe how rested I felt. I also couldn't believe that yesterday was real. 

I grabbed a clean white shirt from my backpack and clean jeans then slipped on my dad's red jacket, how unintentionally fitting the color is.

With my teeth brushed, my hair brushed and pulled into its normal ponytail, and my shoes on my feet, I made my way from my room. The castle lights were still dimmed but my watch told me that I had been asleep for 8 hours. Well, I guess I am an early riser. I wandered around until I found the blessed kitchen and entered only to stop in my tracks when I saw King Shiro and Prince Kairos having a hushed conversation at the island in the middle of the room.

Both of them stopped and looked right at me "Sorry I didn't mean to... I'll just, I'm just gonna go..."

"No, no it's fine we were just talking, come in, have some space coffee." Shiro said, though the look on his son's face betrayed the phrase 'just talking'.

Nevertheless "Coffee?" I couldn't help it, I love the stuff. 

"Well, it comes from the planet Raehvon, Hunk makes it into these little squares, they work just as well as coffee but with less negative side-effects." He smiled at me and offered me a small purple square. I put it in my mouth, it had the consistency of chocolate but tasted almost like lemon-peppermint, which I did not mind actually. 

I chatted with Shiro and Kairos (who, even though I told to call me Gen, continued to call me by my full name) until the rest of the ship joined us.

"Makes sense you would be a morning person, huh, Gen." Jake had replied when I admitted I was up early.

Levi knew it was because usually, I work in the mechanic shop down the road from 5am-11am so I'm used to waking up early, but I denied this information from anyone else.

Breakfast went as pleasantly as dinner the previous night, and then literally all of the adults practically locked the four of us paladins into the lounge room (in which I had opened up my soul into the previous night), and told us to 'bond' as they waited for the black lion to claim it's paladin.

We started with the universally loved game of 20 questions, in which the most notable thing I learned was that I was the only straight person in the room, Kaeza and Jake were both hella gay, and Py was hella ace. Besides that, we learned about how Kaeza had earned all her tattoos in her culture and how Py is half Galra half Sulkarian, and loves to cook as much as Hunk does, and how Jake first discovered he was good at tech when he got caught cheating on a test when he was 12 and went in and erased the databases at his school, and I told them about how I secretly wanted to become a dancer but never had the time to study it.

By the end of the day, I felt truly, that I had friends, that I had actually bonded with these people.

The black lion didn't claim its paladin that day, or the next day, which was the last open to the public. Rumors were already spreading about who was going to be the black paladin.

The lion didn't respond to either of its old Paladins, Shiro or Keith. Allura wouldn't allow training to start until we had the team fully formed, and so we waited.

Four days after I had been claimed by Red, the Black Lion stirred. In a rush, everyone in the castle hurried the hangar. As soon as I came to a halt next to Kaeza, the Black lion reared it's head and landed. As its mouth opened I glanced around the group quickly to see if there was someone I could ask (who in the world it could be in there?) when I noticed one of our party missing.

I whipped my head to the lion again to see a figure descend from its mouth.

The new Black paladin, Kairos.


	4. Bonding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> WE HAD A BONDING MOMENT, I CRADDLED YOU IN MY ARMS -keef ko-gay

Shiro rushed forward and enveloped his son in a hug, Allura not far behind.

"Kairos, I'm sorry for telling you to stay away." I heard him mumble.

"It's ok dad, really." He said, his eye shining with pride and determination. "I know you were just trying to protect me," Kairos glanced at me "and you wanted to give the rest of the universe a chance,"

"But the black lion chose you." Shiro finished for him.

Shiro's eyes twinkled as his wife spoke, "Now that we have the team together, or next priority is to form Voltron."

Shiro looked at the five of us "I want each of you to talk to your mentors, we'll meet on the bridge in 1 varga, it's about time you bond with your lions."

Keith put a guiding hand on my shoulder and lead me from the hangar "Seeing as I piloted red longer than Lance I'll be mentoring you primarily," he said.

"Didn't you also pilot the black lion though?" I asked.

"Yeah, but I'm not about to come in between a father teaching his son," he said with a smile. "Especially not someone as scary as Shiro."

I laughed as we entered a room, it was a big rectangular hall with tall walls and a control room looking down on it. "This is the training deck," Keith explained, "You're probably going to end up spending a lot of time in here."

"Cool."

"Now," he said facing me directly "What we really need to discuss is your new lion." I nodded.

"Red is the most temperamental lion, but he's also-"

"Red is a she."

"What?"

"Red is a female lion, first or all, no mane, and second, I got a very female kind of vibe from her when she chose me." Keith was silent and looked at me with a kind of subtle wonder.

"Ok, well then, she, is the most temperamental lion, but she's the most passionate, and the fastest, and it's harder to bond with her because you have to earn her trust. When I tried to board her the first time, she wouldn't let me in, I had to fight a bunch of galra soldiers and get sucked out of an airlock for her to let me pilot." Keith grinned "I was actually a little concerned that Red wouldn't take anyone with the whole system Shiro and Allura figured out."

"Well, actually, my mother was there and she found us in the crowd, and all I remember was thinking that no matter what I had to keep Levi safe from her. That's when Red appeared behind me and urged me aboard, and so I took my brother and ran."

Keith smiled sadly at me and nodded. "I see why Red chose you then. You have fire in you, and a fierce loyalty. I think you're a great fit for this team. And remember Genesis, if you ever need anything, you know you can always come to me, that's what I'm here for."

I nodded "Thank you, Keith."

Keith held his hand out and something materialized in it. "I also have the pleasure to pass this down to you, the Red Bayard. It belonged to the first Red Paladin before me, King Alfor, then Lance, then me again," I smiled "and now I'm giving it to you, it's rightfully yours. It will take a unique shape with you, and it will be your weapon in and outside of your lion. Hopefully, soon you'll know what I mean." he smiled.

I took the Bayard from him and held it away from both of us. I kind of urged it forward and suddenly a long sword sprang from the handle I held.

It reminded me of some of the medieval swords I'd seen in old history books. It was thin and elegant but not at all like a fencing sword. It had girth to it and it just felt powerful in my hand. The blade itself was the same cool gray as most of the handle, but the edge all around it glowed and hummed with a red intensity.

Keith whistled "Pretty interesting, mine is a sword as well, but yours has a light, electric kind of, well I don't know what to call it, but Pidge's Bayard has the same thing as well."

"Wow," I breathed, holding it out and turning it in my hand. Suddenly the handle shifted from having the grip perpendicular to the blade to having it parallel, like a traditional sword. The circular outside remained in place like a kind of hand guard. "Oh, nice!" I said, holding up the blade in an offensive stance.

Keith laughed "We'll work on fighting stance and techniques later, for now, let's focus on your lion."

Keith walked me through a 'how to pilot' crash course and before I knew it, he was taking me to a dim impressive looking room that had five glass pods, three were empty, and in one was a set of yellow paladin armor, and in the other was the red.

"Suit up," Keith said with a smile, ushering me towards the pod.

When we arrived at the bridge I met with the rest of my team, who all looked as anxious as I felt, including (surprisingly) Kairos. Kaeza passed me a hair tie with a wink and I smiled at her, thanking her as I pulled my long thin blonde hair into a ponytail and fit it under my helmet. 

"I want each of you to get into your positions, this will take you to your lions' individual hangar," Shiro said.

"So like an elevator?" I asked, making my way to the red lion's pod.

"It's more of a zip line thing and then this big drop down with a slide, it's pretty cool," Lance said with a smile.

My eyebrows shot up, but I was already in position. As the floor disappeared from under me I screamed "I'M AFRAID OF HEIGHTS!!!"

I felt the horrifying feeling of falling as I made my way down a chute. With sweaty, trembling hands, I grabbed the zip line handle and held on for dear life, the fear in the bottom of my gut bubbling out as screams.

The zip line finally ended just when I felt like I wouldn't be able to hold on anymore, and it dropped me, hopefully, a final time into a pod racer. I gripped the control with a death grip as it zoomed forward down a tunnel and into the red hangar, where Red sat elegantly. 

When I finally got into the cockpit I sat down it the chair, Red already humming with energy. With a movement of my hands on the control, Red reared up and spun out of her hangar and into the sky. 

As I started looking for the others, Kairos came in over the com, "Lets all land by that big rock for a second to get our bearings."

"Well, there are a lot of big rocks," Py said flaying after Kairos behind me.

Then suddenly Jake's voice shrieked into my ear "Gen you're afraid of heights?!"

"Shut your trap Jake," I said, not hiding my aggression. 

"Oh, yeah, Gen are you alright to fly? I mean, does your vertigo affect you in your lion?" Kairos asked as I landed next to him.

"Look, I'm fine, just forget about it."

"If you say so..." Kairos trailed off as the rest of the lions landed.

"I still can't get over how cool it is to fly Blue," Kaeza said, instantly lightening the mood.

"Yeah, I feel like yellow and I are already connecting." Py offered.

"I'm glad you feel this way, but it's important that you each establish a strong individual bond with your lion, so start out by feeling your way around and getting a sense for your lion." Shiro's voice came over the coms.

I pushed my controls forward and lifted off with the rest of my team, all going different ways.

Red did several twists and flips in mid air that had my gut in knots and I held on tighter and tighter resisting the urge to scream, I could hear Kaeza whooping excitedly and Jake was laughing, but all I could do was hold my breath, wondering if it were better to close my eyes or keep them open. 

Red kept pushing forward and faster and I tried to reign her in. Then I heard Keith in my ear "Gen, relax, Red knows what's she's doing, trust your lion and it will trust you."

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. I let the red hot feeling of my lion invade me and let the sense of security wash over me. 

Like a switch my eyes were open and I wasn't seeing just from the cockpit, I saw what Red saw as she spun in the air and dived towards the ground. I let myself yell out with joy as I pulled back the control last second, feeling the kind of freedom and ease in the air that my lion did.

I joined my teammates' yells of excitement and we flew in conjunction. "Remember that as important as it is to bond with your lion, it's equally important to bond with each other and know that in the heat of battle, what's most important is working together and protecting your teammates," Allura said. "To give you a little taste of this, we're going to run the system defenses and see how you hold up."

"The system what now?" Py asked, his excitement taking on a fearful tone.

The particle barrier went up around the castle and we saw five attack drones fly up and the firing began. 

I'm pretty sure all of us screamed including Kairos, who was now yelling "Quick, behind that rock!" And suddenly I was urging Red faster than I'd had her ever go before. I pushed the blasters backward allowing for a fast stop and landed next to Jake and Py. 

"What do they think they're doing? We don't know how to work these things!" Jake asked.

"That's the point, it's to teach us with experience," Kairos said, gritting his teeth as the rock started to break apart under the heavy fire.

"So what we form Voltron? How do we even do that?" Kaeza asked.

"Well, the old paladins always flew up in formation and just, like, formed Voltron, I don't really know how they did it, they just did," Kairos admitted. 

"Well anything is better than this, I say it's worth a try," I added.

"Besides there is no way we could break through that particle barrier on our own," Jake said.

"Alright on my queue," Kairos said, " 1... 2... 3!"

I pushed off as hard as I could and pushed Red as fast as I could, I felt a laser land a blow on Red's midriff and urged her faster. I instantly took the lead of the rest, which I knew was out of formation and it wasn't until we were out of range that I got back in. "Sorry," I said over Py's terrified yelling "Red's really fast."

"It's fine, but we need to focus on Voltron, on feeling the bond with our lions and the team, everyone focus."

I closed my eyes and breathed, feeling Red underneath me and my teammates next to me. 

I let myself connect with Red like I had before and settled into the energy within her. My head yelled 'Form Voltron' over and over like a mantra as I focused all my energy into my lion.

Aaaaaaand, Nothing.

"Guys I'm not really feeling Voltron," Py said.

"Me neither, I don't really know what I'm feeling for anyway," Kaeza said.

"We need to keep trying, we need to push ourselves and feel the team energy," Kairos advised, and so we did, we kept going and going, looping around the castle just far enough to avoid fire. 

"What are we even doing?" Jake asked exasperated.

"Alright fine this isn't working. Plan B, let's try fighting as a team of individuals, ok?"

"Sounds good to me," Kaeza said. 

"I second that," Jake added.

"Me as well," I offered.

"Yeah me too," said Py, which sealed it, and on Kairos's signal, we took off towards the castle, breaking ranks and firing.

As soon as Red took another hit my deeper connection was boarded up, and I struggled to keep my head focused on avoiding the drone fire and firing back.

Red kept getting hit and there was nothing I could do to stop it. When the first warning popped up, I nervously said: "Um Kairos, I'm getting warning signs over here."

"Yeah me too, I don't think my lion and I can handle this much longer, we're getting nowhere," Kaeza said. 

Kairos didn't respond, and the firing suddenly stopped and the particle barrier fell.

"Oh, well that's handy, so do we go in?" Py asked.

"Kairos?" I asked when he didn't respond.

Then I saw the black lion start to drop, then it was falling.

I pushed red forward and speed under him, metal scraping metal as I struggled to keep him in the air.

"Kairos?! Are you there, what happened?!" Py and Kaeza joined me under the Black lion as we were all yelling to him.

"Shiro, what's going on? Kairos isn't responding." Jake asked. 

Then we heard Shiro's strained voice over the com, "Hurry, get him to his hangar, this is an emergency!" 

We started slowly and then quickened as we pushed the black lion into its hangar. I landed Red right next to it as we all squeezed our lions in the hangar. I rushed down from Red and made my way with Kaeza, Jake, and Py, into the black lion and up to the cockpit. 

Kairos lay slumped on the floor and we rushed to his side. Py shook his shoulders "Hey Kairos, buddy, Kairos."

I took his helmet off and felt his pulse. "He's alive at least, just knocked out, but gosh what happened?" 

Just then Coran and my brother ran into the cockpit and Coran said: "Hurry, we need to get him to a healing pod."

Py and Levi took his arms and the rest of us supported his torso and legs as we carried him out of his lion.


	5. Tenebris

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> pronounced, ten-eh-briss

"Shiro, we need answers," I said, keeping my gaze focussed on Kairos in the healing pod in front of me, and Allura in the one next to him. I could see Kaeza hit him with an accusatory glare out of the corner of my eye.

Shiro sighed. "About 1 month ago Allura and Kairos felt an energy, something potent and dark. It was controlling Quintessence, pure raw energy. The force was farther away than we had ever traveled, by a significant margin, exponential. As soon as they felt it, we ran to our lions, only to discover, they were no longer responding, as so, we opened the lions up to find new paladins, because if there's anything in the universe that could handle this, it was Voltron."

"What happened just now, was a surgance of the energy, it's on a level of magic only Altean sorcerors posses, which is why it only affected Kairos and Allura."

"When will they be out?" Py asked. 

"Not long, I'd say about half a Quintent," Coran spoke up from the monitors.

"How long is that?" Kaeza asked. 

"About 9 hours," Pidge said.

"What do we do until then?" Jake asked.

"Eat?" Hunk and Py asked in unison. They high-fived.

And so we ate.

It was another kind of dinner where everyone was happy, we all tried to ignore the whole, evil energy thing and just bond with each other. Kaeza at one point whispered next to me "Look at how cute Keith and Lance are." She gushed.

"Kaeza they're married," I said with a curious smile.

"I know, but, I don't know, kind of makes me wonder if I'll ever find a wife out here in space."

"Did you have anyone back home on Decaria?" I asked her.

"No, I wish."

"I'm sure you'll find someone, you have a really magnetic personality and I mean, you are a paladin of Voltron."

She flashed me a cheeky grin "Well, did you have anyone on Earth?" 

"No, I didn't really have the opportunity you know?"

"Yeah, but you like boys right?"

"Yeah."

"How about Kairos then? He's pretty cute huh?" she wriggled her eyebrows at me.

I rolled my eyes "Chill out he's our team leader." I quickly made sure no one had heard what Kaeza said, and it looked like no one did except for Lance who winked at me as he talked to Pidge and Hunk about something.

Oh geez.

The meal ended and Shiro let us lose to talk with our mentors and do some training. I was planning to go check on Kairos and Allura first, but Keith and Lance scooped up Kaeza and me, and took us to the training deck. 

They started us on a gladiator fighter, and the most important things I found out where 1, I am not good at fighting, and 2, Kaeza's Bayard is hella sweet. It took the form of a slim and elegant trident and the prongs at the top were made of the same electric kind of thing the edge of my blade is made of. 

It was a while until Jake and Py joined us and all the original paladins went into the monitor room and watched us from there. It was a bit easier to fight off the gladiator with Jake's blaster, and Py's huge blaster canon, they made a great range team, and Kaeza and I were working together well with close combat. We even beat it a few times.

As good as we were feeling as a team, it felt empty without Kairos there. After we did a kind of invisible maze exercise, Shiro set us free for the day, and we only had 1 and a half more hours to go before Kairos and Allura where out of their healing pods.

That's how we all found ourselves reconvened at the healing pods waiting silently for the two to exit.

Allura was first as her own teammates rushed to her side. As soon as she was out she whispered something to Shiro and they left the room quickly as Shiro said: "When Kairos gets out, tell him to find us if he's feeling better, Allura found out information on the energy." The old Paladins all rushed out quietly discussing something as the four of us watched Kairos's pod carefully.

When the doors finally opened we all rushed forward to catch him as he fell. 

"Tenebris." He muttered.

"What? Jake asked.

"It's called Tenebris, the energy, the darkness."

We helped him to his feet.

"Your mom said she has information about it, she's with the old Paladins right now," Kaeza said.

"Yeah, let's get you over there ok?" I asked helping him put his arm around my shoulder for support.

"Thank you guys." He said as Jake took his other side and we helped him out of the room. When we made it to the bridge he decided he felt well enough to stand on his own and he made his way to his mother.

Allura put an arm around her son and continued to talk to the old Paladins, we joined in on the conversation.

"So you're saying the alternate reality we boarded up when we defeated Zarkon is back?" Hunk asked.

"And a creature from this other reality made it's way over the rift and is here and is about to destroy everything?" Pidge finished

"That's exactly what I'm saying," Allura said.

"Mom," Kairos said, and for a second my heart broke because his tone of voice sounded like a scared child going to his mother for help, his next words were back in his normal tone of voice, a big 20 something man, "It spoke to me."

This caught everyone's attention. 

"What?" Allura said, looking at her son with fear.

"Kairos, what did it say?" Shiro asked his son.

"It's, it's kind of hard to explain, It, well it said that it saw me, that it knew who I was, where I was, that it needed me." I shivered "Its name is Tenebris, but, I don't know its words were jumbled up like different snippets were coming in at different times."

"Can you tell me exactly what it said?" Pidge asked, her holoscreen at the ready.

Kairos gulped and his father placed a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"Exactly speaking, it said, 'I see you Hello Kairos, red paladin, I know where lucky you, you are. I need you I'm coming you cannot run and you cannot and they cannot save her save you. Give up now I will break, I'll find you, you soon, soon

I could feel the blood drain from my face. Red paladin?

But I didn't say anything, and it was a few breathless moments until Pidge said, "I found something." and with a flick of her wrist two lines were displayed on the giant screen in front of all of us.

"Statistically speaking, rearranging the phrases as an every other in chronological order, you get these two as the most likely complete thoughts," Pidge said, her voice downcast.

The screen read:

**I see you red paladin lucky you I need you, you cannot run and they cannot save you, I will break you soon**

**Hello Kairos, I know where you are, I'm coming and you cannot save her, give up now, I'll find you soon**

 

I ran. I could hear people calling after me, I could hear Kairos calling after me.

I skid into my room and let the door shut. No one knocked.

**I see you red paladin**

I pulled my armor off and turned the shower on.

**lucky you**

I stepped under the water and closed my eyes.

**I need you**

I let the water run over my face as I stood there.

**you cannot run**

I pulled the towel off its rung and dried off.

**they cannot save you**

I pulled on a clean white T-shirt and jeans.

**I will break you**

I put on my dad's jacket.

**soon**

Someone knocked on my door.

"Who is it?" I called.

"Your brother," came Levi's voice.

"Oh, come in."

Levi came into my room and sat next to me.

"I uh, I'm sorry I haven't been hanging out with you much lately..." He said.

"Are you kidding, if it's anyone's fault we haven't been hanging it's mine, I've been doing all this paladin stuff and I've been leaving you out."

"No don't worry you aren't, I've been working with Coran these past few days and uh, I've come to the decision that, well, I can't stay here."

"What? Of course you can stay here, where else would you go? If I can't leave you can't leave." I said, holding onto his hand. "Levi."

"Gen, it's not my place," He said, "Besides, Matt Holt, Pidge's brother, is looking for an apprentice, he lives on Olkarion and asked me to study under him, Gen I said yes."

"Levi," I whispered, letting the weight of his words rest on me.

"Coran talked to me about how you guys are going to train up until you can form Voltron and then you'll go to Olkarion and broadcast to the people as their new defender, that's when we'll part ways. I'll be safe, you don't have to protect me anymore, ok Gen?"

"Levi it's my job to protect you!"

"It's your job to protect the universe now. Besides, you have to go and kick Tenebris's butt."

I hugged him. "Levi buddy I love you, I don't want you to go."

"I love you too Gen." I let my tears fall on his shoulder. "You've done so much for me, you've practically raised me, you've protected me from so much, now let me make my own way in the world. Besides, I want to see my sister form Voltron."

I laughed a little.

"Thanks, Levi, you should probably go though, I need to sort through this whole Tenebris thing." His expression softened.

"I know, hey you know Kairos right?"

I raised an eyebrow "Yeah?"

"He's really worried about you, you should maybe talk to him when you figure some things out, and don't you dare hide it all inside ok? Take care of yourself, Gen."

"Ok." I smiled at him and ushered him out of my room.

I laid down on my bed and looked up at the ceiling.

It wasn't long before I just got stir crazy and quietly made my way from my room through the castle. I wasn't sure where I was going, and I didn't really have anywhere to go, but I found a room that stretched long and tall and had a big window along the entirety of one of the walls. I sat down and looked out at the night sky, unfamiliar with the constellations I saw, but captivated just the same.

"What was it, a week ago, that I was waking up early to work my job at the mechanics, then come home to teach Levi, he was just on Algebra II. We finalized our escape plan, then that evening I cleaned the Cowan's house and watched their kids for a few hours. When I came home I made dinner. My mother had another party, and as much as I had wanted to take Levi and hide, we had to cater." I sighed.

"I couldn't sleep that night," I told the stars, "my mother passed out in her room with her boyfriend, and the house empty besides them. I remember packing my bag, wishing we had more money than just the 12 gak that Levi had begged for this past week on the streets."

"We got on that train. I never would've thought it would take me here, lightyears from Earth, and a defender of the universe. To add to it all, Tenebris. Is this my destiny? I've never believed in that sort of thing before. I never thought I would ever amount to more than a thing for my mother to pawn off. What does this all mean?"

I looked at the stars expecting them to answer me. They'd never spoken back before, so you would imagine my surprise when I heard a voice say: "I don't know."

I whipped around to see Kairos by the door. I stared speechlessly up at him, how did he find me?

"I like this room too," he said, walking over to me with his eyes on the horizon depicted outside.

He sat next to me and sighed. "I may have overheard the adults talking about... I hope it's ok that I talked to your brother, he told me... Well..." he kept his eyes on the stars even though I starred at him, trying to analyze his words.

"Well, yeah," I turned back to the glass, "now you know." I was unsure what to say. So what, if he knew it didn't matter, did it?

"I want you to know I see you differently." He said, his words cutting into my chest.

"I see you as someone brave, strong, courageous, fierce, powerful." I didn't know why his words made my eyes water. "What you've been through, I can't imagine it. A fate worse than death, and all this? You don't deserve more pain. All the same though, I wouldn't wish you gone for the world, I don't know why I feel so selfishly to want you to stay here with the team. You didn't sign up for this."

I was crying now, silent tears rolled down my cheeks and I let the stars fill my eyes and his words fill my heart. Only Levi had ever cared about me like this before.

"But we all need you, we all need your spirit and your heart and everything that you are."

More tears.

An unidentifiable amount of time passed and my sobs got worse, I had to put my face in my hands and use my jacket to try to dry my cheeks off.

"May I hold you?" He asked carefully.

I nodded.

He slowly placed his arms around me. I turned my cheek against him so I could look out at the stars just beyond the castle.

Eventually my sobs died down and I was left with no more tears to give.

"Genesis?" he asked.

"Mhh hmm?"

"I will protect you."

**they cannot save you**

"Don't ever doubt that."

"Ok," I said, letting myself drift off in the crook of his neck.

_I will protect you_

No one has ever protected me before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ooh spooky prophecy + sad cuddles


	6. Form Voltron

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> that one time Pidge got say it

I woke up staring at my ceiling. Wha-?

Oh.

I couldn't help my blush as I realized I fell asleep on Kairos after I cried my heart out on his shoulder. Geez, he cradled me in his arms.

"Oh man..." I said running a hand over my embarrassed face. I sat up in my bed and checked my watch. Ok so it's only 8:00 am, that's fine. I quickly got ready and put on my normal white shirt, jeans, and my dad's grey with red sleeves jacket.

I made my way to the kitchen for some space coffee, and as I entered the kitchen and greeted Shiro, Allura, Pidge, and Kaeza, Pidge knowingly passed me a square of space coffee.

Kaeza and Allura were discussing something about Kaza's home planet in an animated way when Jake entered the kitchen and immediately asked an engaged Pidge questions that I only understood half of.

I happily listened back and forth between the two conversations until Shiro quietly asked if he could talk to me for a second.

I followed him out into the hall unbeknownst to the rest of the kitchen's inhabitants and stopped just outside the door and out of earshot.

"I hate to have to bring this up so early in the morning, but with what happened yesterday," oh geez, "I just want you to know that it is our job to protect and equip you and your fellow paladins." I nodded, hearing what he was saying but storing it for later, I didn't have the brain power to process it now. "In addition to that, we did some research, well, Pidge did some research, on your mother, our plan was to contact Earthen authorities and well, find you justice, but," Shiro paused, which could only mean two things.

"Either you can't find her or she's dead." I filled in.

He pursed his lips "The later."

I nodded. The woman who had been manipulating and using me and Levi our whole lives was gone, at the same time, so was our mom. My initial reaction was blank. What emotions am I supposed to feel? I don't feel grief, but I don't feel relieved either? Maybe I do... The gentle part of me asked Shiro: "How?"

"Well, she had filed a missing persons report on you and Levi when you were claimed by the red lion, and police were trying to contact her one at some point yesterday morning to follow up when she didn't reply. They found her body in her bedroom, she had mixed alcohol and cocaine in her system and overdosed, it... it killed her."

Thinking about it though, serves her right doesn't it? If she was going to throw away her life like that and destroy mine, she might as well let her mistakes kill her. I decided I didn't have remorse, there would not be 5 stages of grief, she isn't worth that. In fact, my heart feels lighter now, knowing that she isn't looming near, she isn't lurking close, she isn't waiting and biding her time to unleash her boys on me and Levi again to hurt us. It only took thousands of lightyears and her death added together to make Levi and me, truly, undeniably free.

"After all this," Shiro said, probably misinterpreting my silence, "If you chose to leave the Paladins behind and start a new life for yourself and your brother, well, I talked it over with the other old Paladins and we all agree you should get to chose the path of your life from here on out." He said, smiling sadly.

I began slowly, "Levi is going to apprentice under Matt Holt, and he is going to become the greatest astrophysicist of all time, and he's going to get a real education and he's going to live his own life how he chooses. And I am going to make him proud. I am going to protect him in the best way possible and I'm going to protect my friends and all the people in this castle who have taken me in and accepted me, and you better believe I'm going to kill Tenebris if it's the last thing I do, there's no backing down for me." I said, my resolve steeling in my voice.

Shiro's eye twinkled, "I'm glad to hear that."

"I'm glad to say it."

Then Shiro, King of the Castle of Lions and retired Black Paladin, pulled me into a hug. He patted my shoulder and parted saying, "I'm glad you're apart of this team Genesis." I had to stop myself from tearing up.

"Me too."

Breakfast that morning was as fun as every meal in the castle was, and I looked forward to training for the day, Allura had outlined it out for us.

We started the day out with physical training, combat, physical strength, etc. It was really refreshing for all of us to be fighting together with Kairos, our team leader. It was also cool to see the sleek futuristic longbow that Kairos's Bayard was. This training section also taught me that me, Py, and Jake were pretty far behind Kairos and Kaeza in the fighting skill department.

The second exercise of the day was a neurological connection exercise. Coran walked around the circle of us putting the nodes on our heads. As he went down the line a screen appeared in front of each person, I assume to depict what they were thinking about. In front of Kaeza was a group what looked like her friends and family from her planet, and in front of Py was what I assumed was the same thing, as the group looked like it was made up of several different species. In front of me, I wasn't surprised to see Levi, smiling with his stupid goofy grin. In front of Jake were lines of running code that, whatever it was, made him smile. In front of Kairos was a depiction of his family, all the old paladins. 

I turned my screen into Red as Coran narrated the instructions. "Focus on your lion, it is imperative that you empty your mind of any distractions and you focus solely on the connection you have with your lion."

Once all the lions were formed Coran said "Now, feel it in your gut and let your lion guide you. Form Voltron."

I took a deep breath. Clear my head... focus on Red... my lion... my connection...

As The lions convened in the center of the circle, we watched in amazement as the pieces began turning and spinning and reforming, and soon, stood in holograph form before us, was Voltron.

Jake was the first one to cheer, and the rest of us joined in. The adults took this as a sign and that now was a perfect time to get in our lions and try to form Voltron.

The good news is that I didn't scream this time going down the chute. As I pulled Red out of her hangar and flew her down to where Black, Blue, and Yellow were already waiting, I felt my heart beating in my chest, we were really about to do this, we were really about to form Voltron.

I could hear Kairos's grin as he said "On my count take off, make sure that you feel the bond with your lion and through that connection, feel the bond of the team. I believe in you guys, let's do this! Form Voltron!"

With elation I took off, flying in perfect controlled formation. I felt the thrum of Red underneath me and tapped into her. Then I felt the thrum in the air and tapped into the team. I could feel the sky open up and I could feel my lion begin to transform. I couldn't contain the feeling of joint energy and I spun around in joy as Red finished her transformation, and then I slotted her into place as the right arm of Voltron.

With the formation complete we stood, as a collective, as Voltron!

My team went wild and I did too, we were all ecstatic. Soon the old Paladins came over the coms to congratulate us.

"Remember this feeling Paladins, it's something you'll have to tap into whenever we need to form Voltron," Allura said, but she was smiling all the same.

Now that we had successfully formed the legendary hero, it was time to make our world debut, specifically on Olkarion. Allura and Coran went over an airshow we are going to perform and little speeches for all of us.

Kaeza's favorite part was, of course, the huge 'party' of sorts we would be throwing at the castle. A bit of a way to celebrate with the epicenter of the new world.

Despite all the party planning to be had, we spent the coming days training what seemed like endlessly. I also knew that the closer we got to Olkarion, the closer I got to sending Levi off on his own.

I made sure to set him up with a communicator so he could call me and stuff, and he continued to reassure me that he'll be alright on his own. Everday seemed easier though, every day I was grateful to have a team to train with, and a brother to coddle, and knowing that there really isn't a reason to be scared anymore, or worrisome.

We had mastered our airshow, rehearsed the speeches down to a T, and the hilarious part was getting a talk from the adults about proper customs and decorum for when we met the delegates from some of the different planets.

Eventually, we found ourselves on Olkarion, meeting with Pidge's brother Matt, Hunk's wife Shay, and a few others who welcomed us onto the planet.

Keith introduced me to some of the old members of the Blade of Marmora and as they caught up I watched my brother meet Matt Holt, utterly starstruck and his mouth gaping open. Matt laughed good-naturedly and pulled him into a hug and they began a long conversation with Pidge and Jake.

The Blade members excused themselves, and I pulled Keith along with me to Lance and Kaeza who were having an animated conversation with Kairos and some alien I didn't recognize.

Kaeza was telling one of her stories and I couldn't help but smile at the shock on the alien's face as she recounted the tale of how she killed a leviathan and earned the tattoo across her back.

Keith whispered to his husband what sounded like "Lance look, Shiro's talking to Slav, we better see where this goes." In a bemused tone and Keith, Lance, Kairos, and the alien excused themselves and they flitted over to a frustrated looked Shiro and an alien who I assumed was Slav.

"So," Kaeza turned to me "can I ask you something?"

"Sure" I smiled.

"I don't mean to like make you uncomfortable or anything, I'm just kinda worried..."

"Kaeza it's fine, go ahead."

"I just want to know how you're doing, I mean, between the prophecy, and Levi going to stay with Matt, and, well I overheard about your mother. I just want to make sure you're ok... This may be out of place, but I haven't really got any sisters back home, just a slew of brothers, and well, you kinda feel like the sister I never had. I wanna make sure you're ok."

"Wow Kaeza... I don't think anyone's ever said something that nice to me before. I feel like you're family as well, and with all this stuff, I don't know, I think what's getting me through is having you guys to lean on a hold onto."

"I didn't mean to bring up such a heavy conversation right before we broadcast to the universe and then have a party, but uh,"

"No, dude you're fine. It means a lot to know you care."

Kaeza gave me a smile as we mingled into the crowd.


	7. Olkarion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Getting some of that good team bonding, also Allura is a GODDESS

Wearing my full suit of armor still felt a little weird, but the cockpit of my lion held a bit of familiarity as I surveyed the unknown planet below me. I could hear the old paladins giving their opening speech on the platform in front of us as I took a deep breath, listening for our cue.

"Don't be nervous guys, we were all chosen for this, just take deep breaths and feel your lions," Kairos said, at his words, I gripped the controls on Red firmer and pulled up my posture, we're ready for this.

Then suddenly Kairos came in on the com, "Alright that's the signal, form Voltron!"

I took off, controlling my speed as we went into our first formation. So far so good. I moved Red to spiral around after Black and twist into the second shape.

Kairos came over the com to signal us when to release the color stream, adding the effect to the performance.

I reminded myself to focus as I slipped into the energy we shared and felt my lion begin to transform. Timing my movements, Red clicked into her place at the right arm, and Voltron stood above the masses below us.

People were cheering wildly as I drew the sword and Jake drew his shield. After a few moments of coordinated flying, we separated and landed our lions. I made my way from my cockpit and out my lion, all the while taking deep calming breaths. It's going to be fine.

Shiro spoke over the cheering crowd as we made our way down the stage to meet up with the paladins of old.

"I am proud to present my own son as your new pilot of the Black Lion, Kairos Shirogane. Genesis Matthews, the new pilot of the Red Lion, Jake Theil pilot of the Green Lion, Kaeza Swantale the Blue Lion, and Pytorizayn Quanthus the pilot of the Yellow Lion." The crowd cheered as Kairos stepped forward to be beside his father.

"I am very privileged to be here, at the Coalition's Capitol, with you today. And to show the world the new team Voltron. We are the defenders of your home, planet, solar system, and universe." Kairos grinned with determination before continuing. "It's our top priority to not just keep the coalition safe, but to keep our joint civilization advancing."

This is where Jake comes in, "We will be partnering races, planets, technologies, to work together for innovation and exploration."

Py added his two cents next, "We will continue to bring peace to warring nations, planets, and solar systems. Our aim is to preserve and prosper."

"We will fight those who oppress and bring harm to the helpless. We will fight to keep the rights of every individual." Kaeza said next.

"And we will protect." I said, letting the very real emotions creep into my voice, "from the individual to the galaxy, from the person to the planet. We will keep you safe."

The crowd erupted in cheers as I finished off our collective thought.

"Team Voltron!" Shiro said proudly, gesturing to us, inviting the crowd to cheer louder.

My mind filled with static and applause, and I saw Shiro talking to the crowd, I then followed Kaeza off the stage. We grouped up behind the erected curtain and I saw my team along with the adults follow.

I turned to my left to see who I had just bumped into, to meet Kairos's smiling expression.

"Hey, you all did really good," Allura said reassuringly and the other old paladins nodded in agreement.

"You should all be proud of yourselves, you did a fantastic job today," Shiro said.

I tried to listen as Hunk was giving us (mostly Py) a few performance pointers, but all I could think about was now that this was over, Levi would be leaving.

I reminded myself that that's not what's important right now. Right now I need to focus on the team.

Eventually, we began making our way back to the castle and I caught up with Py, "Hey Py, you totally nailed those loops in form 3."

"Thanks, Gen, I was really worried about if I would hit those correctly. It's still weird flying my lion."

"Dude me too," Jake interjected, "I was talking to Pidge, and apparently there are a lot of special powers that we haven't even unlocked yet as well."

"We can do it though," Kairos offered, "I believe in the team."

"Yeah, team Voltron!" Kaeza said with a laugh, accompanying her statement with a dab.

I smiled my way into my room, and was worriedly trying to find something nice to wear, when a very excited Allura found herself at my door

"Genesis honey, come on we're going to get you ready for the party!" She said.

I dragged myself after her letting her excited demeanor rub off on me.

Allura led me to what I assumed was her and Shiro's room, and I tried not to look around and followed her to a long spacious closet.

The walls were lined with racks upon racks of dresses and pants and shirts and skirts and just about anything. I saw Kaeza standing a few feet from the door, examining herself in a mirror. She was wearing a long elegant dress. It was a dark teal color just a few shades lighter than her skin. The fabric shimmered with a kind of glittery iridescence. The dress featured a long split up the side reaching her mid-thigh, showing off the glowing tattoos along her right leg. The dress was long sleeve, but the sleeves had panels cut out of them along the sides showing off more of her tattoos.

"Kaaza you look fantastic!" I said excitedly.

She gave me a wink and posed "Don't I though? And it's all thanks to Allura."

"Oh please." Allura smiled shifting through racks already.

Hanging off the edge of one was a light purple looking dress that had diamonds splattered around it like stars, concentrated around the waist. The skirt was a princess fit and was covered in layers of purple ombre sheer. I assumed this was the dress Allura was wearing.

After a second Allura spoke; "Ah ha, this one is perfect." She said, pulling out a red dress. It was a floor length gown with a more fit and flare style than a big skirt like Allura's or a tight fitting dress like Kaeza's. The dress was a plain deep red and had a simple style and cut. It did have two straps that lay elegantly off the shoulder, going well with the sweetheart neckline.

Allura shoved it towards me, "I mean," I started "I didn't plan to be this fancy."

Allura waved a hand and pushed me towards a changing screen. "It'll be fine, you're gonna look fantastic."

"Ok." I murmured, laying the dress down so I could change.

"Let me know if you need help!" Allura said over the screen.

I stepped into the dress and pulled it up, not really expecting it to fit but it did. I'm definitely a bigger size than Allura. Still, dress zipped up all the way, and I felt really comfortable in it. The fabric was thick and warm (not hot), but it still flowed around me nicely, it's obviously not something we have on Earth.

I stepped out from behind the screen and Kaeza squealed, "Yes Genny! You look gorgeous!" 

"Thank you, but you're looking better," I winked at her.

"Oh stop it," she smiled.

"I must say, I really do have an eye for these things. You look lovely dear," Allura said, nodding in approval.

"Thank you," I grinned and turned to the mirror Kaeza was looking in earlier. I really did look good, like, pretty, beautiful almost.

Allura grabbed her dress off its hook and made her way behind the screen to change, "Gen you can pick out a pair of heels or something to go with your dress, I suggest something gold, it will match your hair."

"Ok, thank you Allura," I said, making my way to the rows of shoes lined up along the wall. Kaeza eventually found a pair for me to wear, they weren't too high and they almost magically fit. 

"Allura, how do you have so many different sized clothes?" I asked.

"Some of it was passed down from my mother, and my grandmother, and so on, so there's a lot of variation. Like that red dress you're wearing, it belonged to my grandmother, that neckline and off the shoulder top was very in style back then." Allura said from behind the curtain.

"Oh well, on Earth, it's very much in style now," I commented as Allura came out from behind the curtain.

She looked beautiful, as the pastel lavender contrasted beautifully with her dark skin. "Allura, you look incredible," I said.

"Yeah, stunning I'd say," Kaeza agreed.

"Thank you, girls," she smiled, "Now what do you think for hair? I'll be keeping mine down, and I think both of you should let yours down too."

"Well, I've always wanted to have a braided crown," I said, shrugging my shoulders.

"Yeah I think that would look really good on you," Kaeza said, "I kind of want to pull some of my dreads back in a twist you know? Kind of half up and half down."

"Yeah both of those sound really good, let me help you two with that," Allura smiled.

By the time we had finished getting ready, my self-confidence had taken a nosedive. How am I going to be able to do this? Especially in front of a castle full of the Coalition's most important people. Gee, I look stupid compared to Kaeza and Allura. I mean, Allura literally looks like the queen that she is, and Kaeza looks like fricken Aphrodite, and I look like a child who got into their mother's closet.

Kaeza must have sensed my nerves and she looped her arm in mine as we walked into the sparsely populated foyer where the party would take place in about half an hour.

I started looking around when a voice interrupted my thoughts, "Who are you and what have you done with my sister?"

I spun around, "Levi." He was wearing a normal looking black suit with a plain dark green tie.

Kaeza tapped my shoulder, "There's a hot space lady over there, I think I'm gonna go say hi." She snuck away with a wave.

I turned back to my little brother with a smile, "Hey, wow you look handsome bro, how'd you get your hands on a suit like this?" I asked.

"Matt is lending it to me actually, I didn't really have anything nice." He said.

I grinned "I will say, I think the dark green is a little obvious." 

He bristled, "Obvious?"

"I saw you and Jake talking it up earlier. He's kinda cute huh?" I said, wiggling my eyebrows.

"Gen, come on, don't be weird. We're just a couple of dudes being guys, guys being dudes.

"You're a couple of dudes being gay." I retaliated.

He fricken _blushed_ , but didn't deny it, "It's not like anything could happen."

"Never say never, little brother," I said, leaning toward him.

"Enough about me though, I was going to say that you look gorgeous."

"Oh thank you."

"Yeah, that Kairos guy isn't gonna stand a chance," I raised an eyebrow "He'll be in love by the end of the night."

"Kairos?" I asked, "Did he say something about me?" 

Levi looked over my shoulder "Well, no, it's just he seems very concerned for you, a little, extra, I might say

"What do you...?" I trailed off and followed my brother's gaze behind me, to see Py, Jake, and Kairos coming our way.

The three of them were wearing military-style double-breasted uniforms, but each where the corresponding paladin color. They were all trimmed with gold and buttons. They all looked incredible.

Jake side-eyed Kairos as they reached us, "Levi, Gen, so good to see you." I tore my gaze from Kairos to give Jake a smile, "Gen, you look amazing, but may I borrow your brother for a moment?"

"Of course," I nudged Levi toward him and jake lead him away.

"Well, Gen, he said it, you look great, but I hope you don't mind that I excuse myself, my parents came down," Py nodded and with a smile made his way from us.

"You look dashing Py!" I smiled after him.

He laughed, "Thank you!"

I turned back to Kairos, "You clean up pretty well, Kairos," I said, offering him smile. His silver hair did look great, stark against his black suit, which fit him pretty well.

"I'm sure you've heard it a thousand times tonight Genesis," he grinned, "but you are positively breathtaking," He said, taking my hand and kissing the back of it.

"Thank you." Kairos was right, I had heard it several times already, but for some reason, none of them made my heart jump until just then 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yikes, how many times can I write smiled before it gets illegal?


	8. First Rise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> oooh, time to get spooky

Being all social and smiling for way longer than I ever had before was really taking a toll on me. I excused myself to use the bathroom and walked from the alien ambassador I had been talking to. I made my way to what I thought was the closest bathroom and sat down on the floor, which was almost uncomfortably spotless. I know I had to get back to the party at some point but my human tolerance meter was close to overflowing.

After a few minutes, I came out to see my little brother waiting outside the door, leaning on the wall.

"Levi, hey. Why aren't you at the party?"

"I saw you make your escape and figured you were all humaned out," he said.

"Yeah, pretty much," I said, looping my arm in his as we slowly wandered towards the party.

"How's Matt? Is he cool?"

"Yeah, yeah he's really cool, I think I'm gonna really like working under him."

"What about Jake, is he cool? I saw you guys nerding out together earlier,"

"Yeah, kind of a shame I'm... but yeah Jake is really cool. Anyway, remember that Physics textbook you found last year that you snuck home to me?"

"Yeah, the green one that I couldn't understand anything from," I said.

"When he went to college that was his like freshman year textbook, so he's got so much on me. It was more him talking to me about stuff than it was collective nerding."

"Could've fooled me but ok." I gave him a smile.

"How's your team though? You guys seem to work well together."

"Yeah, we do. I think it's going well, at least I hope so." I said, my mind wandering to the vision Tenebris gave Kairos, wondering if we could possibly be strong enough to fight him.

"I believe in you guys. You can beat up this joke of a dimension traveler," he said, knowing exactly what I was thinking of.

"Thanks, Levi, I love you buddy."

"I love you too Genny, you don't have to worry about me."

I wiped at the tears forming in my eyes.

"Thanks for making me cry right before we go back into this party stupid," I said, nudging my brother's side.

We shared a sad smile.

It was a least another hour before people started filing out of the castle, and eventually, we started cleaning up.

I was piling cups into my arms as I watched my brother and Matt talking.

"They're leaving first thing in the morning." A voice said next to me.

I turned to see Jake carrying several trays in his arms. I nodded and picked up the last of the glasses, falling into step beside Jake as we walked to the kitchen.

"Bit of a shame really, he's pretty cool." Jake mused.

I laughed "He said the exact same thing about you."

"Oh, really...?" Jake said, looking at the floor.

I shook my head a smiled as we turned into the kitchen, adding the dishes to the pile already formed.

"So, how was your night, all in all?" he asked me.

"Pretty overwhelming I guess, just, a lot of 'new', you know?"

"Yeah, I get that. It's so weird to think about how much has changed. I was most worried about paying rent like a week or so ago, and now I'm most worried about interdimensional bad guys with space magic."

"Yeah, that pretty much sums it up." I laughed, following him as we walked down the hall towards our rooms.

After wishing him good night, I ducked into my room and got into a shirt and pajama shorts as quickly as possible. Before I knew it my exhausted mind blacked out as I flopped into my bed asleep.

My brain swam in a strange place of half-awakeness all night until I was startled awake by a loud blaring alarm. Despite this, I was still half-awake and struggled to pull on my armor, grab my bayard, and took off stumbling down the corridor to the bridge.

I slid to a stop as I watched five or so alien ships firing at the castle through the window. My brain buzzed itself into a now alert state of adrenaline as I barely heard Allura's voice yelling at me to get to my lion. I pushed myself down the chute as I watched my team file into the room.

The fogginess fully cleared my head as the lights rushed past me and I sped through Red's hangar.

"Guys what the frick is going on?!" I yelled through the coms, landing in the pilot seat of red as she immediately launched herself through the hangar door.

"We're under attack by unidentifiable enemy ships, Pidge and Matt are working on trying to figure out what they are now," Shiro said.

"Where is Py? We need to form Voltron." Kairos said over the coms.

I flew a quick lap around the castle firing at each ship as much as possible while avoiding their fire.

"Maybe he's a heavy sleeper?" I supplied as Kaeza grunted over the coms in frustration.

"It's like I can't aim today what is this, I'm right in front of this ship and I can't land a hit."

"Me too, I wonder if this is more than a coincidence," Jake said.

"Are you guys sure? I just did a few fly-bys and landed some hits from all the way by the castle." I said.

"I think I figured it out," Pidge said, "the magnetic field is in huge flux around each of the ships forcing your fires to go astray if you're to close."

"We've seen this strong of a flux before though..." Matt added.

"Well do you know how to get around it? They're getting closer to the castle." Kairos asked worriedly as I watched his lion swerve around me to nudge me away from a laser that probably would have hit me.

"Working on it," Pidge said.

I distanced myself further with my team as we fired at the ships, the closest one nicked my lion's left leg.

"Where is Py?!" Kairos yelled in frustration as we kept moving further back from the castle as the ships got closet.

"I'm coming!" Came a strangled cry from Py over the coms. I swerved to glance at the castle, the yellow lion was shot from its hangar seconds later.

"Finally, let's form Voltron!" Kairos said.

I swooped into formation with the normal heightened sense of energy, then Voltron stood in front of the castle.

"What now?" Jake asked as we fired at the ships unproductively.

"I got it!" Said Pidge, "Kaeza, I'm gonna need you to use your bayard in your lion. I'm sending you a frequency for your lion's sonic capabilities that should disable the magnetic fields around the ships, then Gen can use her bayard for the sword,"

"Then you'll take out all the ships in one fell swoop." Matt finished for her.

"How do I use my bayard?" Kaeza asked.

Just then I watched a compartment open on the control panel of Red with an indentation that looked to be the perfect size of my bayard.

"You'll know Kaeza." Said Lance over the coms.

Kaeza must have seen the same thing as me because seconds later she had formed the sonic cannon.

"Ok, I'm calibrating now," she said, the ships getting ever closer.

"Hurry Kaeza, the shields won't last much longer," came Allura's voice.

Kaeza fired and a flaming orange field appeared and disappeared around each ship.

"Quick, Genesis use your sword!" Kairos yelled.

I jammed my bayard into the indentation and turned. The sword of Voltron formed and with one huge sweep, the enemy ships were falling out of the sky.

When we all returned to the bridge Py was apologizing profusely to everyone. He promised to not sleep with his head buried under several pillows and blankets anymore.

Seeing as there wasn't any real damage he was easily forgiven.

"Aside from that, we need to regroup and take a look at the wreckage," Shiro said.

"Let me grab some observation equipment and we can all head down," Pidge said, dragging her brother, my brother, and Hunk with her out of the bridge. They returned shortly after all decked out in intricate gear and contraptions.

"Let's get to scanning!" Pidge said enthusiastically.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guys sorry this is literally so short, I just had to get something out there, this has actually been done for a while and I keep telling myself like, oh just a little more then I'll publish it and then I don't know how to flow it into the next part and idk here you go, more to come.


	9. Razor 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> PLOT

As we approached the first ship I heard Lance say "This doesn't look so good, Mr. Stark."

I didn't understand the reference, but Keith took it upon himself to swat at his husband.

However, it was very true that the ship didn't look so good, piece of sh*t would actually be more accurate. At first looking at it I was kind of proud that we had been the ones to cause all this damage, but then Hunk said something unexpected,

"This ship was in rough shape before Voltron took a swing at it." Hunk got closer and inspected a part of the hull where the outside panel had been stripped away and the internal wires were exposed. "This wiring is fried, like slow cooked in a supernova, or a red sun. It's a wonder of engineering that this could have been operational. This level of damage couldn't have been done by Voltron in that short battle."

Pidge added on immediately after, "A quick scan is telling me that this was one of the headships for a mission called Razor 7, deployed from planet Ulto about 500 years ago. They were reported MIA about 3 months after launch when communications and trackings completely vanished between the 4 ships on the mission and Ulto."

"Then how are they here now?" Keith asked, sharing a look with Shiro.

"Guess we'll have to find out." Shiro lead us around the ship and into a bay door. "Do we have any other information on Razor 7?"

"Checking on that now," Coran said over the comms, he was back at the castle with my brother, "Ok, so the mission was investigative, Ulto had received strange readings from a deep space satellite and sent Razor 7 to intercept the cause. Unfortunately, I can't figure out what the readings were, there's nothing that explicitly says what it was."

"Can we establish a communications link with Ulto?" Allura asked.

"No... the planet Ulto blew up, something seemed to have sped up the decay of their red sun, the planet is long gone, as of 500 years ago."

His words sat heavily on the group.

"Can we get schematics on the ship? So far we're kind of lost, and not finding anything." Matt asked.

"I've tried that, I can't find anything."

"Great." Shiro murmured, Allura put a hand on his arm and turned to address the group.

"Well, since we have so many here, we should split up, no fewer than pairs of two. Stay on the comms and report anything strange. And try to keep track of where you are." Allura said, taking her husband's arm.

The group began to split off and I followed my team, the 5 of us kept down a corridor until it split off into three ways.

"Well, if only there were 6 of us," Kairos said, glancing between the three directions.

"We probably should have split evenly back there, because the other half of our group is also uneven." I recounted, sharing a look with my team.

"I can go by myself," I said, the exact same time as Kairos.

We looked at each other.

"Wow, that was creepy," Kaeza laughed.

"Here," Jake said, looking analytically at the three paths, "You two can go on the far right, and the three of us will go through the left, and then if either of us find anything we'll report it to the comms, or we'll come back here and then go down the middle together."

"Yeah that's reasonable, wait I get the group of three right?" Py asked, fidgeting with his bayard.

"Yeah, big guy, nothing to worry about," Kaeza said, summoning her trident from her bayard, making glowing blue shadows on the wall.

"Well, I'm just saying it's a little spooky in here what with all the planet destruction and missing ships and stuff," Py said, letting Kaeza guide him down the left hallway.

"I know Py," Jake reassured him giving us a nod as he followed after them.

The hallway was wide enough that we could walk side by side. I summoned my sword from my bayard filling the dim hallway with a red glow.

"You scared?" Kairos asked in a light teasing tone.

"No, just trying to stay on top of things, as a precaution."

I saw him glance at me before summoning his longbow from his bayard. 

We walked in silence for a few moments before Kairos spoke, "So, I've heard a lot from Lance and Pidge and other people about what it's like to have a sibling, but I'm just curious what it's like for you?"

I shrugged, "I mean, yeah, it's great, I love my brother, and you'll have to ask him about being the younger sibling, but for me it's like having a partner almost, not like, a romantic partner obviously," I stuttered, glad my face was already red from the glow of my sword to hide my embarrassment.

Kairos chuckled.

"Sorry that was phrased weird, I mean that like, it's like having a special person close to you that gets you. I know for us, we had to get through everything with nothing but each other. It's a weird thing of having him as my responsibility but also being so glad about it. I've always felt that that kind of love between siblings, deep down, is the same between a parent and their child, at least in regular cases. Like it's the same flavor of love between siblings and family members and friends."

He hummed thoughtfully. 

"Was it weird growing up in the castle, traveling, not really being around kids your age kind of a thing?" I asked as the hallway veered left.

"Well, I don't really have much to compare to, but I guess you could say it was lonely. I spent a lot of time with myself, and I found as I got older it was harder to relate to other people we would meet who were my age. Like we visit Earth a couple times a year for family and stuff, and it got to the point around my teens where I felt alienated."

I tried really hard not to laugh at the fact that he had said alien, cause you know, he's half alien... a bit of a smile flowed over onto my face anyway, "I guess we both had pretty atypical upbringings." I squinted, it looked like the hallway was finally ended up ahead.

"Yeah... speaking of atypical," Kairos said, peering into the door at the end of the hallway.

The room was big, and it didn't look like it was a control room per say, but there was a lot of uprooted and destroyed tech. There were suits of armor littered around the whole room, at least 50 of them, broken and disheveled. Kairos and I crept into the room for a closer look.

Pretty much everything was covered in dark thick stains. There were burn marks and stuff was cut up, it all looked very battle worn. And old. the red glow from my sword upped the eerie factor of the room and forced myself to take a deep breath and stay calm.

I made eye contact with Kairos, "These stains are blood, really really old blood."

His chest heaved with air and he ran and a hand through his hair, trying to smooth out the nerves bubbling over his expression. "Yeah, it looks like there was a fight here," he inspected the suits closer, "They're all the same, so they were either massacred by one thing that got away or they fought each other. The bodies have been here so long they've practically turned to dust."

I wrapped my unarmed hand around myself. If I wasn't a little freaked out before I sure was now. "What could have done this to all these people?"

"I have no idea, one thing's for sure though, it's nothing good."

"Well, yeah," I said, carefully wandering towards the walls.

"You doing ok? Because to be completely honest my skin is kind of crawling with all this right now." Kairos asked me.

I nodded, "I'm fine," I took a look at the tech around the walls, "You think any of this is salvageable?" I asked, running my hand along a panel to look at the wires inside.

"I don't know, let's ask our designated tech experts, we should probably definitely call this in as well."

"Yeah."

But someone beat us to the comms, "Guys, we found something over here," it was Matt.

"We're in the control room, and all the tech is destroyed, like someone came in here and intentionally ripped it up. There's two crew in the room as well, both long dead, like something killed them, pretty violently." Pidge elaborated.

"Can you find out anything from the tech? Allura and I can't find anything," Shiro asked.

"Not likely, it's not just shredded it's all fried like the wires outside," Hunk said.

"We have something similar over here," I cut in, locking nervous eyes with Kairos, "This room doesn't quite look like a control room but all the tech is ruined. On top of that, however..." I trailed off, finding myself unable to continue glancing around at the mass of dead bodies around me.

"I think the rest of the crew is in here, about 50 people," Kairos continued for me, "They're all dead, like, gruesomely dead."

The comms were silent for a moment.

Shiro spoke next, "Gen, Kairos, turn your beacons on, we're all headed that way."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> omg guys sorry this one is short too I'm trying my best to get these written quickly, I'm a mess, anyway hope you enjoyed, thanks for the support! More to come ;)


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